Do You Want to Be Special? (6)

The world is unfair.

Unfair without a doubt. Sure, arts and sports are the domain of talent beyond effort — but isn't this a bit much? This time, in an entirely different sense, I stared at the utterly unbelievable numbers and despaired.

"Wow, Lee Doha's composition, 34%? 34? Thir-ty-four~?"

Those insane tracks from earlier were only 34% of what this guy actually had? So this is why they say art is for people born with it.

"What a rigged game."

Life isn't easy on anyone.

"Hearing it from you actually makes it credible, and that pisses me off."

Just thinking about competing with guys like these to land in the top ten was already giving me a headache. I dug my fingers hard into my throbbing temples.

Sugar was what I needed at times like this, but the choco bars I'd had on me had already been raided by Seo Taehyun and Dan Haru during their late-night practice. With no other option, I grabbed the box of tangerines Ju Eunchan had stocked up on and headed back to the living room.

"Well, at least we're in the same group for this month-end eval, so whatever."

I kneaded a plump, richly orange tangerine one-handed, peeled the thin skin, and bit into the flesh — sweet, tangy segments filled my mouth.

Nodding at how satisfying it was, I picked my charging phone back up and opened the messenger app. In the group chat pinned at the top, the chatter was still going strong.

〈Miro_Hyung_Gong Seok ‖ Still, I'm the hyung — this is kind of embarrassing.〉

〈Miro_Younger_Yoon Taehee ‖ Aww no way hyung hehe〉

〈Miro_Younger_Yoon Taehee ‖ You sing great anyway hyung (thumbs-up emoji)〉

〈Miro_Younger_Yoon Taehee ‖ Please carry us on main vocals (praying-hands emoji)〉

〈Miro_Younger_Kim Wonho ‖ but do we really not need to prep anything?〉

〈Miro_Younger_Kim Wonho ‖ we just trust Hajin-hyungnim?〉

'They've been running their mouths.'

In the group chat I'd set up for month-end prep, the three of them (everyone but Lee Doha and me) really weren't stopping. I didn't need to read every line to know it was month-end-eval anxiety talking.

'Should probably check these guys' stats too.'

The skill wasn't leveled up enough yet — I still had to see the person directly. Planning to hit the groupmates with it first thing tomorrow, I dropped a short, tight notice into the still-buzzing chat.

Notice

Tomorrow's month-end meeting starts at 4

Everyone bring stage refs for what you like, what you're good at, what you want to do

Everyone think about the position you want

※ Everyone who reads this MUST reply confirming (I'll call if you leave me on read) ※

└ 〈Miro_Younger_Yoon Taehee ‖ Confirmedddd! (OK emoji)〉

└ 〈Miro_Younger_Yoon Taehee ‖ Hyung if I tell you what position I want you'll let me have it?〉

└ 〈Miro_Younger_Kim Wonho ‖ Kk kk〉

└ 〈Miro_Hyung_Gong Seok ‖ yeah got it Hajin thanks〉

Barely any time after I posted, the unread 1s vanished in a flash, one by one, replies confirming from the group. I answered Yoon Taehee's question — whether saying his preferred position out loud would actually get him it — with 'usually, yeah,' and popped the last tangerine segment in my mouth.

└ 〈Miro_Same-Age_Lee Doha ‖ Got it.〉

Nice to see everyone was quick to check messages. Once I confirmed even the last one, Lee Doha, had replied, I muted the group chat and tossed the phone aside. Stage references could wait.

"Hajin-hyung — what are you doing?"

"Hyung, we're back."

I was lying back down peeling another tangerine when the front door opened and today's overnight lodgers — homeowner included — trooped in. Dan Haru and Seo Taehyun, faces obviously warm and just-showered, walked into the living room shaking out their hair tiredly, spotted me, and stopped in their tracks.

"Whoa, what are you eating alone!"

"Tangerines. Want one?"

"Obviously."

Dan Haru, who liked food about as much as I did, made a beeline to sit next to me, and I handed him one. Seo Taehyun, carefully setting the bag off his shoulder down in a corner of the living room, watched us both and then asked in a near-horrified voice:

"…Hyung. Please tell me you didn't eat through all those peels by yourself just now."

"Yeah, what about it. Want one?"

"…Did you get in a fight with the tangerines or something?"

"What are you talking about."

"Because you were eating like one of you wasn't going to make it out alive."

…I, I didn't eat that many though.

"Why are you deflating a guy who's enjoying his food."

"Doesn't the phrase usually go 'a kid,' not 'a guy'?"

"Why are you deflating our kid who's enjoying his food."

"Where's our kid?"

"Right in front of you. Two of us. Kang Hajin, twenty. Prime eating years. My mother's son."

"Dan Haru, seventeen. Naturally the age for eating well. Had one roll of gimbap today."

"…Yeah. Fine. My bad. Eat all you want."

Faced with Seo Taehyun's exasperated expression, I brazenly pointed a thumb at myself and tilted my chin up. "Don't even drink cold water in front of a kid" — sure enough, Dan Haru, who'd already made quick work of a tangerine, promptly flashed a V at his chin and echoed my line. Watching that theatrical nonsense, Seo Taehyun nodded with the face of a man who'd achieved enlightenment.

And Ju Eunchan, homeowner of this place, coming in last of all — took one look at Dan Haru and me striking cool poses on the living room sofa with a mountain of tangerines, and said,

"Please collect the peels properly when you throw them out. And don't drop crumbs."

"Yes sir."

"Yes sir."

…Well, he was the homeowner. Better to fall in line.

---

Hajin didn't particularly dislike group projects.

He carried the confidence that he could pull a task like this off solo at above-average quality, and he was also good at finding the right roles for the right teammates.

The reason he'd shifted into planning and production after quitting as an idol trainee in his first life was that he'd known he had that knack. As long as someone had the will to try, Hajin was pretty good at reading what a person could do and what they knew how to do, and putting it to use.

But.

When those teammates weren't people he'd picked himself, weren't people he was close with, and on top of that had wildly different working styles, (not that he couldn't handle it) he did get a little (very, very little) stressed.

Just like right now.

"Then, like — right in the middle, a double tumbling!"

"How about we go with this ballad instead? I honestly love this song."

"No, come on, let's just do 'Love affair.' It went pretty well when we prepped it that time."

"Ah. Or Sphere's new song this comeback? 'Hush,' was it?"

Every time songs the groupmates had allegedly hunted down got posted to the group chat overnight, Hajin had rubbed his eyes wondering if these bastards were serious.

Still, they were guys who'd been trainees longer than him. He'd told himself this was probably just the transitional purgatory of mindless reference-hunting.

And then, watching the No-Hope Trio go through with actually pulling those songs out at the month-end meeting, Hajin thought:

'A ballad? Looking to get flattened by Jung Siwoo and Dan Haru?'

'How is your first instinct to recycle something we already used in performance class?'

'If you're not sure you can outdo Sphere, shut it. And how are guys who haven't even graduated high school going to pull off suit-sexy?'

The urge to say all of it was clogging his throat, but Hajin knew. With guys like these, killing morale from the start did no one any good. They'd stayed up all night grasping at ideas for the sake of survival — better to coax and cajole them at first.

"Oh, you all really found a lot. Plenty of solid ideas in here too…"

"Hyung, I also watched this video. It uses masks and fire—"

"I dug up the stage from the group that got first place in a past month-end eval too."

"Uh, I'm dead set on doing a ballad."

Give them the right amount of agreement and the No-Hope Trio wouldn't stop — fourth verse, fifth verse, same point on loop. I'd have to cut this off at a reasonable moment.

Looking for a topic that could double as a mood-reset, Hajin spotted Doha — who'd sat silently watching them through the whole meeting — and turned to him.

"Doha, what do you think? About what the guys brought."

At Hajin's line, every eye in the room swung toward Doha in unison. Yeah, what about you, Doha? Doha-hyung's opinion matters too. The groupmates murmured.

And Lee Doha, who'd been quietly listening the whole time, spoke up for the first time.

"Me."

"Yeah."

"None of it's any good."

Ah, this unhelpful bastard.

"Uh, that's—"

"None of the ideas you all brought are any good."

'What is that eight-foot giant with the busted brakes on about now.'

Catching the room going instantly cold, Hajin fired an urgent shut-up-already look at Doha — but Lee Doha, as socially oblivious as Ju Eunchan and as sharp at reading the room as Seo Taehyun, didn't stop.

"There's a real chance the ballad ends up compared with Siwoo-hyung's group. I saw him print out a ballad set list yesterday."

"……"

"High-difficulty acrobatics might look great, obviously, but without proper coordination inside a short window, it's easy for it to come out sloppy."

"…Uh, well…"

"Repertoire that got used in a prior evaluation should be off the table. And I think Sphere-sunbaenim's comeback track — given the obvious point of comparison — is also better left out."

'That crazy bastard—'

Wrecked. This mood was past saving.

I rapidly scanned the No-Hope Trio's moods. Their motivation nosediving like garbage in real time was showing up in different flavors on every one of them.

First: brutal rationalization.

"But still, finding this much in a day — isn't it pretty good? I don't think it's THAT bad."

That was Kim Wonho, who'd come in with a performance you'd only see from a fired-up third-year boy group at a knife-sharpened year-end stage.

Second: brutal self-destruction.

"…Yeah, well, everyone's database is just limited, obviously… Ah, honestly, I did want to look harder. Truth is, the more I searched the less I knew. Like, this kind of concept, or this…"

That was the excuse from Gong Seok, who'd searched until he'd exhausted every high-scoring Miro month-end stage in the archives.

Third: brutal rebellion.

"What did you bring, hyung? Just declaring everything's bad without offering any opinion is pretty bad itself, you know that, right?"

At ballad-parrot Yoon Taehee's slick rhyme, Lee Doha's brow furrowed.

"You should share what you brought too, hyung, if we're being fair."

Snotty tone and snotty attitude, but he wasn't wrong. In group projects, the only thing worse than a freeloader is the veto-everything bot. Lee Doha, apparently conceding as much, nodded along. He quietly pulled out his phone.

"Uh, me."

"……"

"I wrote a song."

…Opening with the cheat code?

At the flat delivery, Yoon Taehee's reaction briefly short-circuited. His lips flapping wordlessly, he soon asked in a disbelieving voice:

"Ah, hyung, you mean a song you had already written, right?"

"No — wrote."

"So a song you already had."

"No, wrote a new one."

"…Yesterday?"

"Yeah. Early morning."

'What is that guy even doing, seriously?'

Yesterday when I'd barged into his practice room, it was already well past evening. He hadn't mentioned any new song the entire time I was there, which meant he'd written it after — meaning he really cranked out a beat in a single night?

'Wish these talent freaks would just get lost.'

While the rest of us stood there stunned, the sole one keeping his composure — Lee Doha — hit play on the new track from his phone.

It opened with slow, heavy electronic bass and drums, sharp string sounds stacking harmonies on top, one by one.

A melody-driven pop track that made no secret of trying to spotlight the vocals. (The guide vocal was Lee Doha's own voice slathered in autotune.) Synth bursts landing at the right points, build-up hitting the right timing — the song was, to put it plainly, 'right in the pocket.'

'The perfect difficulty for guys ambiguous at both dance and vocals to pull off looking decently cool.'

Which meant Lee Doha had done his own thinking too. About this group's skill levels. Including his own dance ability, probably.

Sure enough, the groupmates' clouded faces cleared like sunrise breaking over Mt. Halla.

"I love it!"

"You wrote it really well. Was the chorus written with somebody in mind? You've thought about parts a bit, right?"

"Come on, hyungnim, if you had a trump card like this, you should've said something from the start!"

Once they felt 'we can do this,' they got chatty all over again — you'd struggle to find guys easier to read than these. What were they going to do after debut, acting like that?

'Yeah, the song's definitely good.'

A Lee Doha–written track — no way it flopped. With that song, we'd probably clear this month-end eval without much trouble.

And this time, again, the problem was that I had zero intention of leaving it at that.

"Sorry, but."

"……?"

"We're not doing this song for our month-end, guys."

"What?"

"Come again?"

Told you your hyung's whole life is riding on this, kids. Don't get comfortable.